Dt Sa SHE PacifiCat fast ferry is get- ting progressively slower. Finally launched into regular service last month with suitable fan- fare, the sleek new example of B.C. shipbuilding know-how has enjoyed anything but smooth sailing since. Dogged by cost overruns and delayed launch dates from the outsct, the vessel continues to run into bad operational weather. Even its inaugural run started 30 minutes later than scheduled. Since then, logs sucked into the ferry’s jet engines have stalled the ves- sel at Horseshoe Bay and Nanaimo ferry terminals resulting in sailing cancellations. Its vehicle carrying capacity has been reduced from 250 to just under 220. And the PacifiCat’s prodigious wake has raised a furore from resi- you said it “Pm sick of walking around hiding. I’m not going to ran away meckly any more. ’'m not x going to take id of doing what I have to do to walk alone in peace on my own street.” Corinne Branigan, on applying some strect Icvel justice to be July 14 Lea’ Knight Crime and long way home any more. I’m not a taunting youth. (From . Punishment column.) : oe a00 north shore news VIEWPOINT st dents in island communities all along its route. Bowen Islanders are leading the charge with threats of a lawsuit and complaints that the wake poses signif- icant environmental and safety threats to boaters and homeowners. The outcry has forced the vessel to slow from its top speed of 37 knots to 25 knots near islands on its route in order to reduce the size of its wake and the negative impact from its wash. Coupled with docking, loading and unloading complications, the speed adjustment has further eroded the benefits of crossing time reductions initially promised for the expensive vessel on the Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo run. The PacifiCat’s status as a white elephant continues to grow with each Loya Or 80 ago it was 4 fairly harmless AW GEEZ, OUR FAURE AOING SPOT IS BUINED! WHAT WIPED IT BUG KILL?... LOSGING COMPANIES?... / ity and murder the DON'T snitch on your buddy to the authorities — that’s been the code of howour among kids from time immemorial. Until 20 years few friends. A vacationing friend, Dr. Richard Cudmore, had asked him to keep his eye on the Cudmore home while they were away. On New Year’s Eve Cudmore's 19-year-old son Jamie took advantage of his par- ents’ absence to throw “They shared lives and laughed a fot. The North Vancouver sun shone. The smog, only in Vancouver, did- n’t visit us.” *"" .° -Richard Walton, B.C. Games for Athletes with a Disability host comznittee president, on the 730 people who volunteered _ toassist the 650 athletes who took part in the Games in North Vancouver. (From a Jrely 14 oan Sports story.) ly many ways, in fact, turning our sensé of ourselves over to medicine seems to be making things worse. Surveys ~ tedly confirm that a generation of education about ction has led to people's spiralling out of control now ‘more than ever.” "Drv Stanton Pecle, discounting modern reliance on medi- "ne to solve drug and alcohol addiction. (From Hana Mercer's . July 16 Faie Comment column.) i oh - 800 ; .’ “Recreatio:,, That’s.a:good word and I hope it is a “maxim for teaight’s decision-making. Your three ycars in office would end in a fine way with the charged with action.” ; _; Former West Vancouver mayor Derrick Humphreys, urg- ing West Vancouver District council to proceed with a plan to ~, upgrade recreation facilities in the district. (From a July 16 ews story.) oes os 00a ; Chr the years T've had a chance to tall with Jean ” Chretien, Mikhail chev, Dan Quayle, Pierre Elliott .. Tradeau, Gerald Ford. Maybe it was time for some new adventure, so I'm ready.” a, ; - Nardwuar the Human Serviette, West Vancouver musician, - broadcaster and impresario, recuperating from a brain hemor- o rage in Lions Gate Hospit’:. (From a July 16 News This Week y. You are now North: Store Mews, founded int 1969 23 a independent subrban newspaper and queitied undes Scheduls 311, Paragraph 111 of the Excise Tax Act, is published each Wechesday, Friday and Sunday by North Shore Free Press ‘Lad. and distributed (0 every door on the loth d-breaking — youth “ethic.” In those good old days we were talking about offences like a rat released on the class- room floor or, at worst, maybe the odd weekend rock thrown through a classroom window by a disgruntled Grade 8-er. But since the 1980s, vio- lence by school students of both sexes has taken a much nastier turn — as witness the Victoria murder by her 16-year-old peers of Reena Virk, the school massacre at Littleton, Colorado, and the copycat school shoot-up at Taber, Alberta. But the worst case yet of wickedly misplaced youth loyalty to monsters in their midst continues to fester 19 months Jater in the mountainside community of Squamish. It was there, on Dec. 31, 1997, that well-liked 40-year-old lawyer Robert McIntosh — happily married father of now six-year-old twins, 2 strong man and a competitive triathlete — died from repeated kicks and blows to the head dealt by wildly partying youths. To date, . despite a $10,000 reward, the youth code of silence has prevented any of the young murderers from being arrested. MclIntcsh was celebrating New Year's quietly at home with his wife Katy and a a party there at which about 150 teens and young adults turned up. As he’d promised his friend, McIntosh went " over to check. For his ains he was brutally aten to death in an upstairs room occupied by cight to 12 youths. The RCMP know their identities, but the refusal of their friends to talk has hindered the laying of charges. Initially, they charged 20-year-old Ryan MacMillan with mansiaughter, but had to stay the charge nine months later to col- lect more evidence. Meanwhile, McIntosh‘s widow — now living in Victoria — has filed a civil lawsuit against the Cudmores, MacMillan and any other suspects. ' nan unrelated incident — except for what it may possibly say about the youth . —- Jamie Cudmore was sentenced last year to four months in jail for his part in a campsite brawl. As if all this were not enough, there’s a still more disturbing angle to the tragic story. Following the murder many Squamish residents, especially in the upscale Garibaldi Highlands where the ; cIntosh family lived, decked their hous- es and cars with blue ribbons to signal a’ demand for early justice. But many of the LAST YEAR'S CAMPFIRE. don’t mix — ribbons were ripped off. Rumours circu- lated that youths involved would retaliate against ribbon-flyers. One blue-ribbon woman was threatened by youths outside a store. ~, . Ray Peters — Squamish Chamber of Commerce's 1999 Citizen of che Year ~ and a longtime friend of the McIntosh family — continues to fly one of the | remaining blue ribbons from his pickup’s, antenna. But, he says, “you can’t do much if nobody’s talking.” . What docs Bob McIntosh’s senseless murder tell us about our end-of-millenni- um society: ; : It tells us that —- although we're 2°. doing OK with the 80% plus of young = - people destined to grow up into fine citi- . zens — we have to get a helluva lot tougher with the hardcore 15-20% whi think they can flout al! society’s rules,. tight up to murdcr, and et away ‘with it because their buddies will never squeal on them. And in cases like murder we have. to be equally harsh'on the buddies who know but won’r talk. In a very real sense they are accessories to murder, |... __Let’s stop fooling ourselves that all kids are inherently good, just because: they’re not yet, twenty-something. And teens who have not yet learned that their first loyalty is to the society that nuriares them — not to criminal thugs and mur- derers in their midst — need to have the book thrown at them just as hard as we eventually throw it at those they seek; with their silence,.to protect. ).°* : :.,0@00_-- “WRIGHT OR WRONG: Buses stop ‘at’ bus stations. Trains stop at train stations.’ What stops at workstations? =: a -_ > = nwright@uniserve.com: LETTERS TO THE EDITOR” ” Letters must include your name, - - full address & telephone number, VIA e-mait: trenshaw @ direct.ca Classified Manager 590-6222 (282) Entire contents @ 1999 North Shore Free Press Lid. Ail sights reserved.